Samorost 3 gets lovely trailer and release date

Amanita Design has announced that Samorost 3, the point-and-click adventure game about a tiny space dwarf who lives in a very strange corner of the galaxy, will be out on March 24. The studio also unveiled a wonderful new trailer showcasing some of the game's bizarre, beautiful environments.

“Surreal” is kind of a hallmark of Amanita's games, which also include Machinarium and Botanicula, and it all started with the original Samorost in 2003. But where that game was a relatively small, browser-based affair, Samorost 3 is its “biggest and most ambitious project” ever: Players will travel to five different planets and four moons on a quest to discover the origin of a magical space flute that fell from the sky.

Experience has taught me not to get too worked up about a trailer, but it's also taught me that Amanita makes games that are really up my alley. And this video promises everything that it specializes in, in spades: light-hearted gameplay, an intensely weird yet beautiful world, and music that I will continue to listen to long after the game is over. And it's been almost four years since the release of Amanita's last game. So yes, years of accumulated cynicism notwithstanding, I'm really looking forward to this one.

If you haven't picked it up yet, a six-track “Pre-Remixes” EP of the Samorost 3 soundtrack composed by Tomáš Dvořák, aka Floex, remains available for free (or more, if you're so inclined) from his website. And if you're new to this whole Samorost business, you can get a taste of what it's all about from the original Samorost and Samorost 2, which remain playable online. More info about Samorost 3 itself is up at samorost3.net.